Neutron Dragon Attack

by Aaron Crash

  His father was also talking, but Blaze couldn’t hear him between Arlo’s growls and the ever-present whispery voice.

  Meat for the butcher. Flesh for the maggots. Souls lost in rain and twilight. Hush, little baby, don’t you cry. You only live so you can die.

  Blaze glanced up at his real father, who was looking on him with such love, Blaze got a lump in his throat.

  He turned to look at his foster father. Arlo was a vampire, and he was reaching down to rip out his throat.

  Blaze was jerked from the vision. He opened his eyes. Man, those death endorphins were strong stuff. If he could bottle them, he’d make a million dollars. Too bad only severe trauma triggered the endogenous morphine in the Human head. Damn.

  Now, he felt terrible. He was in sick bay, no surprise there. He reached over to see if he still had a left arm. Dude, he did. It was gonna be a good day. He felt for a scab or some sign of injury on his shoulder. He only felt skin and his solid muscles from hours upon hours of training, weightlifting, and kicking ass. Thanks, in part, to Arlo, the bastard.

  He knew the vision was mostly a lie since Arlo would cut off his own head with a rusty hacksaw if he ever got bit by a vampire. Death before dishonor was Arlo’s motto.

  Blaze let out a long sigh. “Fuck my life.”

  “No, that’s my job,” Trina said. “Well, at some point, once we get to know each other a little better. And I get used to being a goddamn evil piece of shit.”

  He turned. Trina sat on the other bed, head in her hands.

  “Damn, Trina, I’m sorry,” he whispered. “How many did you kill?”

  “Just the one,” she said. “Landau was a real prick. He had a file on him, tons of sexual harassment charges. He was a real scumbag. He raped one of his cadets. Landau’s father was a senior VP in our corporate offices, so he made sure no one went after his rapist son bastard. But the truth? I didn’t care about any of that when I latched onto his neck. Two gallons of his blood…it went down like so much strawberry daiquiri. I drank so much, so fast, I got a Slurpee headache.”

  She lifted her green eyes, hard yet hurt. The pain in them was very clear. Her freckles dotted her skin, making her so cute. Her hair was the color of a sunrise, bright red.

  “Come over here, baby,” he said.

  She slid off the bed and gripped his hand with her left hand, fully restored.

  He stared into her face. “It was Elle’s plan, wasn’t it?”

  Trina nodded, jaw muscles clenching.

  “And once you got on board the ship, she relaxed her magic on you. She unleashed you like we unleash Cali. It was Elle, not you. She’s to blame. You couldn’t control yourself.”

  Trina swallowed hard and closed her eyes. He knew she was struggling to stay strong.

  “Not gonna cry?” he asked.

  “Not in front of you and not right now. I do it like a normal person…alone, in my room, screaming into a pillow and plotting revenge.” She smiled, but it was a broken, wretched thing.

  “Look,” Blaze said. “You feel bad about murdering someone. That’s good. That proves you’re not truly a vampire. And you saved us. I hate that we use you and Cali like we do, but what are our options?” He thought about what Arlo had said. Every time he sent Cali into combat, it hurt her. And it added another stain to Blaze’s soul. But he wasn’t about to stop. No, he’d worry about his soul when something finally did kill him, and his sister wasn’t around to use her Onyx magic to heal him.

  Blaze pulled himself up from the bed, and though dizzy, he held her to him. Once again, he was impressed with her inner strength.

  Trina sighed and said, “Both Cali and I are monsters, but we’re monsters you can use. It’s like what Granny used to say to Elle… ‘God draws straight with crooked lines.’ If there is some kind of goodness in the universe, if it can’t use evil every once in a while to do good things, it’s stupid and useless. If you only rely on people doing good, shit is never going to get done.”

  Blaze drew back. How could an IPC bureaucrat be so tough and so wise? She’d said she had an alcoholic father growing up. Maybe it was the battlefields of her home life that had put such iron into her spirit.

  He smiled at her. “Dammit, girl, but you are something.”

  She drew him into a kiss, their lips touching, and then their tongues. In seconds, both he and Trina were sweating and breathing hard. Blaze wasn’t sure he wanted their first time to be in the sick bay, but once again, the adrenaline rush of battle had put a fire in their loins. Blaze was undoing her blouse buttons when Fernando entered the room.

  The Clicker, all seven feet of him, thin as Blaze’s thigh, stopped and stared.

  Trina hid her face in Blaze’s chest while the gunny glared at the doctor. “What, Fernando?”

  The Clicker doc chattered, “Please don’t stop because of me. If you are willing, I would like to witness your mating. As you know, I am gathering more information on the various physiological components of Human sexual activity. Your elevated heartbeat, dilated pupils, and changes in your respiratory function would lead me to believe that mating is a rather stressful activity. But that isn’t the case, is it?”

  Trina eased away from Blaze. “I’m going to go take a quick shower. We should be hitting Hutchinson Prime soon. I wanted to look at the data Lizzie gathered before we get there.” She left Blaze to deal with Fernando.

  Blaze checked out her butt as she left. He sighed. When was he going to get some alone time with his new girlfriend? Never, it seemed. Once she was gone, he opened the tactical display on his implants to see where things were at.

  His VHI was low, down under twenty percent. He’d been unconscious for about an hour, and they were circling the twin suns in a fixed orbit. They weren’t going at light speed anymore, just slowly circling the stars. Blaze switched to camera view to witness the amazing celestial lightshow of one star eating another. The solar flares, the light, and the energy were being pulled away from the yellow star into the rotting flickering light of the neutron. The size of the spectacle was staggering, though the dead star was tiny compared to the yellow star. The dead ball of decaying fusion energy, however, was far denser. Take an ounce of the neutron’s star stuff and drop it on the top of the Empire State Building and it would smash through everything to get to the earth’s core.

  Why were they orbiting the stars and not the planet? Something else seemed to be going on.

  Fernando clicked. “I’m sorry to disturb you, but I thought you were too weak for sexual intercourse.”

  Blaze pounded on the Clicker’s back. “Fern, ol’ buddy, most guys are wired to bang, no matter what kind of shape they are in. It’s why we have billions of people around. Let’s go see why Bill isn’t taking us to the planet.”

  They left sick bay and went up the steps to the engine room. The doors slid open, and they saw Bill hanging from a harness on a rolling track he’d set up on the ceiling. Xerxes had cut off all of the Clicker’s limbs on his left side, so only his right arms and his right leg were left. He used his main arm to pull himself around the room and his lower arm to work controls and keep the engines working.

  The engineer clicked. His brother translated. “Bill says he hates you, but he would like you to know he loves the new Lizzie. It seems Xerxes had a special affinity for Bill all along, a deep affection and admiration.”

  Blaze rubbed his forehead. “You can’t be serious. Bill and Lizzie can’t be in love.”

  Bill clicked and clacked and chittered, making a wide variety of sounds.

  “Most definitely,” Fernando said. “You see, I’ve heard of little Human boys pulling on the pigtails of girls they like, or putting reptiles down their shirts, and generally being unpleasant. It seems Xerxes was similar.”

  “But instead of putting a frog down his shirt, he cut off Bill’s arms and leg?” Blaze asked, not really wanting to know the answer. Damn, but the drama on his ship was exhausting.

  “It is precisely that,” Fernando said. “I see
this as a very good situation. Given Lizzie’s new talents.”

  “What talents?” Blaze did want to know the answer to this question.

  “Lizzie was able to create the spacetime wave and maneuver us through the asteroid belt, the wasps, and the Paladin command ships. Without the nanosecond changes to the calculations Lizzie made, we would’ve smashed into a rock or been pulled out of the wave by the IPC engineers. Lizzie also found the tracker Denning was using to track our movements. At this stage, the IPC doesn’t know where we are. Thanks to Lizzie.”

  The demonized computer broke through comms. “Aww, shhhucks, it was nothing. I’d do anything to save Bill.”

  Bill clacked some more.

  “Nombre de Dios.” Blaze sighed. “This is my life.”

  “And we are your family,” Fernando said.

  “So why are we orbiting the stars and not Hutchinson Prime? And how long do we have before the stars collide?”

  “It’s one p.m. earth standard time,” Fernando said. “According to Bill and Lizzie’s calculations, we have eleven hours. By midnight, EST, the stars will destroy each other. Such a cataclysm will annihilate the entire star system, including Hutchinson Prime…and Granny.”

  Bill clicked and his brother translated. “Hutchinson Prime is mostly deserted, but there are Humans still there—Humans only, since both the Clickers and the Meelah were logical enough to leave. However, the population is sparse, gathered together in clusters, and completely surrounded by Onyx entities. We can’t say for sure what has taken over the planet, but the entire world is awash in demonic energy.”

  “Crap,” Blaze cursed. “Nothing is ever easy. Hey, guys, have you seen dragons around the stars?”

  Both Clickers went silent.

  It was Fernando who finally answered. “Dragons are mythical creatures from Earth, though there are legends of Meelah winged worms that are similar. Since Clickers are a species of logic and reality, we don’t distract ourselves with such stories.”

  “Yeah, you guys are right, I just dreamed it. It’s not like we’re going to end up fighting dragons. Ha, space dragons. Sorry.” Blaze still felt something was up. That vision had been so real. He’d even smelled the alcohol stink exuding from Arlo’s pores. “So, what are we waiting for? Onyx energy or not, we have to get to Granny on Hutchinson Prime.”

  “We lost our blue-fire engines during the fight. Ling is outside, welding and making repairs while Bill adjusts settings in here. Also, Elle didn’t want us to go down there until she talked to you,” Fernando said.

  Bill was back to swinging around the room, working on getting their close-range engines back online. He clicked and Lizzie chattered back, definitely lovestruck. Yuck. Could his pinche crew get weirder?

  “Keep up the good work,” Blaze said. “I’ll go talk to my sister.”

  He checked his display and found her in Cali’s room. That also put a thorn in his gut. The three of them had a tumultuous history together. They’d saved Cali from the evil werewolf pack that killed her parents, turned her into a monster, and then brainwashed her into joining them on their rampages. Blaze had almost put a silver .45 caliber bullet in her skull, but she’d pleaded for mercy. He gave it to her, they hooked up, and then Elle had tried to steal Cali away. It had ended with Cali wolfing out and nearly killing everyone on the ship and eviscerating the Lizzie Borden.

  Elle had recently told Blaze she was thinking about getting back together with the werewolf. Yeah, not a good idea at this stage of the game. Once they found Granny, got the location of the Onyx Gate from her, and shut that damn portal forever, Elle could self-destruct with the werewolf. Until then, he needed them.

  Blaze tromped back down the staircase and hit the galley. He snatched up a quick carne asada burrito, leftovers from their victory feast, and a bottle of Fleapiss, a Clicker beer. The bugs might not have stories, but they could brew booze like no one’s business. And they loved to gamble. Pearl, in her casino at the core of Fleabugger, made a fortune on Clickers throwing chance sticks and stones.

  Ten seconds in the re-heater, and he was sucking down the warm meat in the flour tortilla and chasing it with the dark bitter beer. Damn, but it felt good to be alive.

  Trina walked by in a towel, still wet from his shower. She gave him a sexy smile that could melt a comet and let her towel slip a little so he could see the cute crack of her shapely ass. She then strutted into her room in the library.

  Blaze had to adjust his pants.

  Then he was knocking on Cali’s scratched-up door. He initiated comms. “Hey, Elle, Cali, can I come in?”

  “Sure.” Elle opened the door. Blaze wasn’t sure if she’d used the remote control or her magic. It seemed his sister’s abilities were supercharged, so she was using her mojo more and more.

  Elle lay on the couch, holding Cali, who was looking shook up. Tears stained her cheeks and her eyes were red. And what do you suppose the quiet Mormon girl was holding?

  The mysterious calico cat sat on her lap, purring, her eyes half-closed from Cali’s loving caresses.

  SIX_

  ╠═╦╬╧╪

  Blaze remembered his promise not to walk around without weapons, but he’d broken that vow. Here he was, facing the calico cat, without a single gun. Something about that cat was off.

  “So you can touch it?” Blaze asked.

  “Yeah,” Elle said. “She’s a pretty little kitty, isn’t she?” His sister gave him a knowing look, and he wasn’t quite sure if she was talking about the cat or Cali. His sister was a total perv, but Blaze didn’t have any time for that.

  “Cali, are you okay?” Blaze asked.

  “Why do you ask?” She couldn’t look him in the face. She petted the cat with her fingernails, which were once painted blue, but were now chipped and chewed upon. She looked tiny, sitting with his sister, petting the cat.

  Blaze crossed his arms across his chest. “Well, after you ripped out my shoulder, I got you Human again, but then you attacked me again. Said you hated me, which is fine, but it was out of character. And here I find you with my sister, petting a ghost cat.”

  “Raziel is not a ghost,” Elle said. “She’s just a cat. Not sure how she got in our ship. Maybe when we were impounded in Fleabugger she chased a mouse on board. I don’t know.”

  “Elle is right. Raziel is just a cat,” Cali said.

  “Raziel?” Blaze asked. “How did you two come up with that name?”

  “It’s from the lore,” Elle replied. “Raziel is the angel of mystery, the keeper of secrets. I think it fits, since the kitty is such a mystery.”

  Blaze wasn’t sure he liked it. Or the cat.

  Cali let out a long breath. “Blaze, I wasn’t myself in the cargo bay. I…I…I was going to tell you and Elle that I can’t be wolfing out as much. I’m finding it harder and harder to become Cali again. In the cargo bay, I hated you, Blaze, for impaling me with the silver spear and then getting me to fight again. Not that my wolf self doesn’t like to destroy everything and everyone around her, but she doesn’t like that she can’t feast on your heart.”

  “Yeah, it’s a problem,” Blaze said. “Not being able to feast on my heart.”

  “I’m not kidding,” Cali said quietly.

  Elle popped in. “So Cali is out for a while. Which should be fine. I have Granny’s syringes, so I can power up at will, and I’m kicking ass lately, and we have Trina—”

  Blaze cut her off. “About that—you can’t be using her like you did with the IPC attack ship. She feels terrible. She only killed the one guy, who seemed like a scumbag, but really, Elle, we can’t go around killing people.”

  “Kill one pendejo to save our asses?” Elle asked. “It’s pretty clear that I got that right. If we can close the Onyx Gate, we save billions, no, trillions of lives. If you include the Meelah and the Clickers. So, if I’m not murdering billions of people, whatever I do is fine. Greater good and all that. What about Cali? You unleashed her. She easily could’ve ignored the drones and g
one after the people in the attack ships.”

  “I’m right here,” Cali murmured. “You could have asked my opinion.”

  Blaze thought about it, but he was too into the fight with Elle to respond. “If Cali went for people, we could’ve closed her bracelets,” Blaze said. “And Fernando might’ve been able to talk her down like he did before. Maybe.”

  “I do like Fernando,” Cali whispered, “even when I’m not all evil.”

  “Big damn maybe there,” Elle snapped. “At least with Trina, we can reason with her. Kind of.”

  “Enough,” Blaze barked. “You do shit like that again, I’ll kick you out of my crew.”

  Elle leveled her gaze at him, and he locked eyes with her.

  After several beats of tense silence, it was Elle who finally spoke. “You don’t mean that, Blaze. You need me. You need us all. We’re family.”

  “Ling said there’s two mistakes people make with family. Listening to everything they say and ignoring everything they say. I’m serious about this, Elle. No more killing people.”

  Elle glanced away. “I will do my best, but I’m not going to promise you anything. I knew you wouldn’t like our plan. Trina’s arm is back, and she won’t need to feed for a few days. But getting her blood is going to be an issue. You, Cali, and I are tapped out for a while. Fernando said there is artificial blood that should work. I’m thinking it won’t. So either way, it’s a problem. Good news, after Trina drained the asshole rapist captain, she blew his head off with a fusion pistol, so he won’t turn.”

  “And how is that going to make me feel better?” Blaze asked. “He’s still dead.”

  Goddamn, his sister was soulless. At times, she seemed as bad as the demons they fought. And she knew it. She’d told him that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Now, her powers were off the charts. If she did become the evil witch-queen of Onyx, he might find himself in a situation where he’d have to go up against her. He didn’t like his odds. And he was just beginning to kind of like her and his strange family.